Collection Overview

The papers (donor no. 480) were donated by Dorothy Paul in 2000 and subsequent years.

Access:

The papers are open for research.

Copyright:

Copyright held by the donor has been transferred to The University of Iowa.

Audiovisual:

Three videocassettes (V336-V338) shelved in videocassette collection.

Artifacts:

In Box 11.

Photographs:

In Boxes 2, 8, 9, 12, and 13; slides in Box S-10.

Processed by:

Sharon M. Lake , 2006. [PaulDorothy.doc]

Biography

Human rights activist and educator Dorothy Marion Bouleris Paul was born in Cohoes, New York, in 1927 to Elizabeth Frances Quinn Bouleris and Joseph Napolean Bouleris, a mechanic who was unemployed at times during the Depression. Dorothy Bouleris, the second of four children, graduated from Catholic Central High of Troy, New York, in 1944 and then worked at various secretarial jobs for nine years. She married physician David M. Paul in 1953, and the couple moved to Iowa City where David Paul joined the medical faculty of the University of Iowa. The Pauls raised two children: Phillip, born in 1954, and Elizabeth, born in 1957.

Dorothy Paul entered the University of Iowa where she completed a BA in general studies with a concentration in global studies in 1981 and an MA in American studies in 1984. Her graduate work focused on Third World women in the United States.

Paul became involved in the United Nations Association of the United States of America ( UNA-USA) in 1965 as a volunteer for the United Nations International Children’s Educational Fund (UNICEF). She served as president of the Iowa City chapter of UNA-USA from 1972 to 1974, and was named executive director of the Iowa Division in 1979, a position she held for over twenty years. Following her resignation in 2000, Paul continued to serve the UNA-USA Iowa Division as chair of the program committee.

UNA-USA (known as the American Association for the United Nations until 1964) is a national organization dedicated to strengthening the United Nations and enhancing U.S. participation in international institutions. Paul stated in a 1990 speech that UNA-USA carries out its mission through a combination of “public outreach, policy analysis, and international dialogue.” UNA-USA consists of a network of over 150 regional chapters and divisions, and belongs to the World Federation of United Nations Associations (WFUNA), which is composed of chapters from over fifty nations.

The UNA-USA Iowa Division began in 1953 after Eleanor Roosevelt, at the invitation of Dorothy Schramm, visited Iowa and spoke in Des Moines. Several local chapters were soon established across the state; the Iowa Division held its first Annual Assembly in 1955 and began publication of its newsletter, Iowa UNA Forum, in 1964. The UNA-USA Iowa Division also developed two annual statewide programs—Model UN and the Iowa Youth Symposium.

During Dorothy Paul’s tenure as executive director, the UNA-USA Iowa Division organized numerous local and international conferences, and conducted several major studies. Paul emphasized the connection between global and local issues and actions in her speeches and essays about the work of the UNA-USA Iowa Division, and through the structure of the forums and conferences she organized. The executive director of the national programs of the UNA-USA praised Paul’s work by stating, “The Iowa Division annual report [for 1991] is in a class by itself, not only because of its heft, but because of the truly outstanding work that it documents.”

Paul’s work reflects her interest in women’s issues. She attended several UN conferences on women (including Copenhagen, 1980; Nairobi, 1985; and Beijing, 1995), and participated in “feminist” tours of China and Scandinavia. These tours, organized by Meg Bowman, a sociology professor at San Jose State College, highlighted women’s work and their international connections.

Paul networked with many local organizations including the University of Iowa Women in Development Committee, the Iowa City Foreign Relations Council, the Center for Global and Regional Environmental Research, and the Iowa City Human Rights Commission. She played a central role in organizing local programs to celebrate International Women’s Day for many years. In 2000, following her resignation as executive director of the UNA-USA Iowa Division, Paul took a volunteer position with the University of Iowa Center for Human Rights. From 2002 to 2004, she coordinated the local Spring Walk for Women in Afghanistan, a program initiated by the United States Committee for the United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM/USA).

Paul has received numerous awards and accolades for her work. In 1995, she received the Arnold Goodman Award from UNA-USA at the national convention in New York. The UNA-USA Iowa Division bestowed on her its highest award, the Scroll of Honor, in 2001. Numerous local organizations, including the Emma Goldman Clinic, the Iowa City Human Rights Association, and the Iowa City Human Rights Commission, have also honored Paul for her contributions to furthering women’s and human rights.

The Biographical Information series (1983-2006) contains an autobiography Paul wrote in 1983, which compares the lives of three generations of women in her family: her mother, herself and her sisters, and her daughter. Paul describes what has changed historically for women in the areas of education, work, and family life. The series also includes a Christmas family letter from 1985 and a description of Paul’s daughter’s 1990 wedding in Mexico. Newspaper articles about Paul complete the series.

The bulk of the Writings series (1979-2004) is composed of Paul’s published guest opinions and letters to the editor. Paul defended and explained the mission of the United Nations, supported arms control measures, discussed global environmental issues and economic conditions in the Third World, addressed the problems faced by women in the US, urged the Senate to ratify the Convention to Eliminate All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), and opposed the war in Iraq begun in 2003. Academic papers and miscellaneous essays complete the series.

The Speeches series (1984-2005) includes over thirty speeches by Paul that describe the issues and projects of the UNA-USA Iowa Division and report on UN conferences. The speeches are organized by date, and most are identified by title and location or occasion. Some folders include multiple drafts or information about the group or event Paul was addressing. Additional speeches are located in other parts of the collection; for example, some speeches Paul gave before or after UN conferences have remained with the conference series.

The Conferences series (1975-2000; 2006) comprises the largest segment of the collection. Paul attended three major conferences sponsored by the United Nations (Nairobi, Kenya in 1985; Rio de Janeiro, Brazil in 1992; and Beijing, China in 1995). Each of these has its own series, presented chronologically; papers related to additional conferences follow in their own series. The papers of the three major international conferences are arranged as follows: preparatory materials first, conference materials next, and materials related to local follow-up meetings are last. UN conferences are accompanied by non-governmental organization (NGO) conferences, which often address more controversial issues than their UN counterparts. Paul’s papers include documentation from both UN and NGO conferences.

Most of the materials in the UN Decade for Women series (1975-1985) relate to the 1985 conference in Nairobi, Kenya, which marked the end of the Decade for Women and was, by all reports, a high point in international women’s activism. The preparation materials include articles written by Paul to promote the conference. Forum 85, the daily paper of the NGO conference, includes articles on controversial issues such as the participation of lesbians, the wearing of the veil, and the accessibility of the conference; most of the articles in this paper are written in English, but a few are in French and Spanish. The series includes a condensed version of the “Forward Looking Strategies” adopted at the conference, UN bulletins describing progress made towards their goals, and an undated report titled “Progress achieved by the Chinese Women in the Realization of the Objectives of the United Nations Decade for Women: Equality, Development, and Peace.”

The Earth Summit (formally known as the UN Conference on Environment and Development) series (1991-1994) begins with materials from the three-day preparatory international conference on environmental issues held in Des Moines, Iowa, which Paul organized. The conference featured international panelists from countries such as Zimbabwe, Indonesia, Argentina, and Canada; U.S. participants included Ed Muskie, former U.S. senator from Maine and keynote speaker Al Gore, then a U.S. senator from Tennessee. The series includes transcripts of the testimony presented at public hearings in Des Moines by Iowa’s scholars, business people, politicians, activists, and heads of organizations and agencies such as the Izaak Walton League, the Sierra Club, and the Leopold Center for Sustainable Agriculture. Information on a national teleconference broadcast from the University of Iowa featuring five panelists speaking on the need for global coordination to address environmental issues is also included. Materials from the Earth Summit conference in Rio de Janeiro include slides, programs, a list of U.S. participants, and materials from WEDO (Women’s Environment and Development Organization). The series documents a major project sponsored by UNA-USA Iowa Division after the conference, “Beyond Rio: Earth Charter Iowa,” which culminated in the publication of Earth Charter and A Social Agenda 21 for Iowa in 1994. The series includes Paul’s written review of this project, which received an award from the Iowa Humanities Board.

The Fourth World Conference on Women series (1994-1996) includes materials from workshops held in preparation for the conference in Iowa City, and letters from Paul to UN officials regarding problems securing a site for the NGO conference. Conference materials include a transcript of First Lady Hillary Clinton’s speech, newspapers published at the conference, slides and photos, guest opinions and letters to the editor written by Paul, and information on the Interagency Council on Women instituted by President Bill Clinton to implement the U.S. commitments made at the conference. The series includes a report on the first major national meeting after the conference, “Bringing Beijing Back,” held in Davenport, Iowa, and attended by Bella Abzug and Charlotte Bunch. Other follow-up activities documented in the series include programs held in Johnson County and caucus resolutions suggested for introduction at the 1996 caucuses. The CEDAW folder includes a copy of an in-depth series of articles on violence against women published by the Dallas Morning News in 1993, which profile international issues. A videocassette containing reports given by Paul and two other women who attended the conference in Beijing (Margaret Weiser and Peggy Huston) completes the series.

The Conferences: Other series (1977-2000) is largely comprised of materials from conferences sponsored by UNA-USA Iowa Division during Paul’s tenure as executive director. They are arranged alphabetically by title. Many conferences had two parts: a series of local community forums followed by a state-wide conference. If the two parts had different names, the materials are filed together and both names are included in the title. Folders include materials such as grant proposals, brochures, program notes, press coverage, and final published reports. The press coverage folder of “Women Hold Up Half the Sky” includes an exchange of letters among Dorothy Paul, Dorothy Schramm, and Des Moines Register editor Geneva Overholser about the Register’s failure to cover the conference. Materials from several women’s conferences sponsored by other groups complete the series.

Most of the records in the UNA-USA Iowa Division series (1955-2005) document the work of UNA-USA Iowa Division while Paul was executive director. Annual assembly booklets include reports on projects and events from UNA-USA Iowa Division officials, local chapters, and affiliated organizations such as the League of Women Voters and the American Association of University Women. The letter from Eleanor Roosevelt was a form letter she sent out to many groups asking them to support the work of the UN; the signature on the letter is a facsimile.

This series includes materials related to two major studies conducted by UNA-USA Iowa Division. War and Peace and Iowa (1982) is a four-part study of nuclear war, military spending, and the peace movement in Iowa, which drew on the research of local chapters of Physicians for Social Responsibility and the Consortium on International Peace and Reconciliation. This folder includes progress reports and correspondence during the research phase, a copy of the final report, and media and public response. Materials related to Feeding the World (1980) include the grant proposal and budget from Iowa Humanities Board, minutes of the study committee, and the report distribution list, which included President Carter, elected officials, journalists, media outlets, activists, and agricultural organizations. Replies from most of Iowa’s congressional delegation are included as well as press coverage of the study.

Other projects documented in the series include the twinning project, which paired UNA-USA Iowa Division with a local branch of the UN in England. After reading War and Peace and Iowa, the director of the North-eastern Region UNA-UK, Norman Easton, noted that the Iowa Division was working on many of the same issues that his group was addressing. He proposed a “more practical link,” and thus began an exchange of materials, ideas, and transatlantic visits between the two organizations. The folders on the twinning project include correspondence between Paul and Easton, pamphlets published by British locals of the UNA-UK on peace and weapons issues, and documents relating to a student exchange between the groups. Paul noted at the UNA-USA national convention in 1985 that this twinning program had been cited as a model project. The folder on miscellaneous events of 1991 includes materials on World AIDS Day. The folder on The Unclaimed Birthright, a short film featuring Governor Robert Ray promoting the concept of world citizenship, includes information on the film and requests to borrow it. A videocassette features Paul as a panelist on a program hosted by the Iowa City Human Rights Commission as part of the celebration of the 50 th anniversary of the Universal Human Rights Declaration; other panelists are Marilyn Cohen of Emma Goldman Clinic, Monique DiCarlo of the Women’s Resource and Action Center, and Jael Silliman of the women’s studies program at the University of Iowa.

Paul’s general files are arranged by date and include correspondence, reports, press clippings, and a few scattered photos, some of which may be duplicated in other parts of the collection. This series includes research Paul conducted to design and lead a feminist seder celebration at the Unitarian Universalist Society in Iowa City in 1991. The folder on Paul’s recognition dinner following her retirement as executive director of UNA-USA Iowa Division includes a tribute by Burns H. Weston, the main speaker of the evening, as well as Paul’s remarks and a remembrance by her daughter, Liz.

Publications include Iowa UNA Forum, the UNA-USA Iowa Division newsletter (published three or four times a year), which Paul edited as one of her duties as executive director. Iowa UNA Forum is catalogued in the Special Collections Department of the University of Iowa Libraries where additional issues can be found. The Iowa Resource Catalog is a listing of organizations offering projects, plans, and resources to promote the advancement of women. Global Sisterhood Projects lists information intended to link Iowa women with the global women’s movement. The Role of the UN is a curriculum guide for grades 7-12. Iowans Support the United Nations on its 60 th Anniversary offers an historical overview of UNA-USA Iowa Division and includes two articles by Dorothy Paul—one on Dorothy Schramm and the other describing UNA-USA Iowa Division’s programs.

Paul’s work after her resignation as executive director of UNA-USA Iowa Division is documented in the Additional Human Rights Activities series (1999-2006). The series includes materials on Paul’s work with the University of Iowa Human Rights Center (UIHRC), the Spring Walk for Afghanistan Women, and International Women’s Day activities. A videocassette of a forum on women’s internationalism that Paul moderated in celebration of International Women’s Day in 2001 features three international local women from Siberia, Sudan, and Liberia.

The Resource Files on Women series (1972-2000) includes brochures published by UNA-USA Iowa Division and information on women’s lives both locally and globally. The materials from the Feisty Feminist tour include a packet of academic readings, an annotated itinerary, slides, and a photo album. The itinerary has a few handwritten numbers in the margins; these are slide numbers that can be cross-referenced with the slides for more detailed information about them. Sometimes the Feisty Feminist tour is referred to as simply the “feminist” tour of China.

The Artifacts series (1992-2004) includes a few press passes Paul used at UN conferences and several buttons from the Johnson County Reads program.

The Photographs series (1985-1995; 2006) consists of both photographs and slides taken on Paul’s trips abroad to participate in conferences and tours, and there is some duplication between the two formats. The photographs are organized in three albums, one each from the feminist tours of China and Scandinavia, and the third from the Fourth International Conference on Women in Beijing. The photos remain in the albums in the order in which Paul had originally organized them.

The slides are organized chronologically. Each individual slide is labeled with a two-part code: the first part is a capital letter designating the location of the conference (N is the 1985 UN Women’s Conference in Nairobi; C is the 1987 feminist tour of China; R is the 1992 Earth Summit Conference in Rio de Janeiro; and B is the 1995 UN Women’s Conference in Beijing). The second part of the code is a number; the slides were removed from carousels and kept in Paul’s original order. Paul used these slides during programs she gave following the conferences. Notes that identify the slides, taken by the processor after viewing the slides with Paul, complete the series.

Shelved in IWA printed works collection:The Kitchen: A Map to the Highway of My Life

Recipes collected and written by Dorothy Paul; illustrations by Ruth Muir

Related Collections

Beverly Everett

Board member of UNA-USA Iowa division and member of the United States National Commission for the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organizations (UNESCO)

Kathleen Wood Laurila

Attended Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing

Dorothy Schramm

President and founding member of Burlington chapter of UNA-USA Iowa, chair of UNA-USA Iowa Division (UNA-USA was called the American Association for the United Nations at the time), and director of UNA-USA

“International Forum on World Environmental Law and Institutions, Des Moines,” 1991
Midwest public hearings on environment and development, Des Moines, 1991
Midwest teleconference, University of Iowa, 1992

“Priorities ’95: Anticipating the UN World Conference on Women in Beijing,” 1994-1995
World women and media workshop, 1995
Problems with site for NGO Forum, 1995
“Report of the Holy See,” with Catholic feminist response, 1995 and undated
International Women’s Tribune Center, 1993-1995

Forum ’95, The Independent Daily of the NGO ForumBeijing Watch, A Daily Paper of the Fourth World Conference on WomenThe Earth Times, newspaper of record for the Fourth World Conference on WomenWorld Women, published by China Daily

Iowa UNA Forum, 1979-2001 (scattered)Iowa Resource Catalog, 1991Global Sisterhood Projects, 1991The Role of the UN in the Advancement of Women: Toward a Partnership World, 1993Iowans Support the United Nations on its 60 th Anniversary: A History of Iowa’s Connections to the United Nations, 2005

ADDITIONAL HUMAN RIGHTS ACTIVITIES

Center for Global and Regional Environmental Research, 1999-2005
International Women’s Day programs